In my most recent book, co-authored with my husband, Jim, the final chapter discussed how to have a “charmed marriage.” We listed several ideas. My favorite two are the following: Pray together. Grow spiritually. For those of you who do not incorporate these two in your marriage, I encourage you to do so.  Let me give you a scene from a recent morning.

Early mornings, Jim and I have our coffee together (he drinks tea, but I digress). We have a journal open, ready for my pen to write down requests. We talk about the coming day. About needs for our family. We discuss world events. Our nation. Our church.

Yesterday, we talked of the recent meeting with our financial planner. In this meeting, Rick, together with the two of us, discussed our future finances. He gave us some suggestions of different financial moves we might want to make. We considered his suggestions the remainder of the day,  and again later as we dropped off to sleep.

“I’d like to pray about our finances,” Jim said, taking a sip from his steamy mug, “I think we should ask for faith to trust God for them.”

I diligently wrote down the request. We continued in our readings from the 31 Days of Praise by Ruth Myers. Each day, the author includes verses from Scripture and then summarizes them. We look up the verses first, and then read the summary of them.

Right after Jim asked me to write down that prayer request, we read the next verse.

17 He did all this so you would never say to yourself, ‘I have achieved this wealth with my own strength and energy’ (Deuteronomy 8:17 NLT).

I was gobsmacked by that verse! We had just discussed we needed to pray about those said finances, and then this! Do I believe God is real and present in my life? Yes! Here it was right in front of our eyes. We learned from that passage that we don’t do this all on our own, but with our God! It’s so true. God has supplied everything we have needed from each of our earlier lives to the present.

A simple verse. But what power in those words!

Some of you no longer have a mate to sit beside you and read together and you miss that terribly. I understand those feelings. I’ve been there. Yet I didn’t give up the reading and praying when I was alone–for when we read in God’s word, we aren’t alone–He’s there with us. With you. With me.

Some of you have a mate, but they aren’t interested in searching out the Scriptures or praying together, I was also there at one point in my first marriage. Don’t give up. Keep meeting with your Savior. Pray. Later in that marriage, we did read the Bible together and pray.

Remember, He is there. He loves you. He wants a relationship with you.

Praying at church is beautiful, but you can pray anywhere.